The Best Camp Axes
A camp axe is the one tool at a campsite that does work a knife and a folding saw cannot. It splits kindling, drives stakes, limbs branches, and notches wood. The test is whether it is still sharp on the third day and whether the handle is still tight after a week of hard use. Most camp axes from chain hardware stores fail the first test by day two and the second test within a season. The axes on this list are forged or hand-ground, fitted with handles of hickory or ash, and sharpened before they leave the factory.
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How to Choose
Head weight is the primary spec: 1.5 to 2 pounds is the camp hatchet range; 2 to 2.75 pounds is the true camp axe range that processes larger wood. Hickory is the traditional handle material -- it absorbs shock without splitting and can be replaced in the field. The poll (the back of the head) should be solid and ground flat for driving stakes and pegs. A convex grind on the bit -- what old smiths called an appleseed grind -- is better for chopping than the flat Scandinavian grind, which is better for slicing.
Gransfors Bruks Small Forest Axe
Gransfors Bruks has been forging axes in Goteborg since 1902. The Small Forest Axe weighs 1.5 pounds on a 19-inch hickory handle -- the right size to carry on a pack without noticing it, heavy enough to process kindling and limbing. The head is hand-ground, the edge arrives sharp enough to shave with, and each axe is stamped with the initials of the smith who made it.
The smith's initials are not a marketing gimmick. They are Gransfors Bruks's guarantee that a human being examined this axe before it shipped.
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Hults Bruk Almike Camp Hatchet
Hults Bruk has been forging axes in Huskvarna, Sweden since 1697. The Almike is a 1.3-pound camp hatchet on an 18-inch American hickory handle. Swedish steel, hand-ground convex edge, leather edge guard included. It ships sharp. The Hults Bruk design language is traditional -- plain head, straight grain hickory, no polymer anywhere.
1697. That is the founding date. Axe-making knowledge compounds over three hundred years.
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Council Tool Boys Axe 2.0 lb
Council Tool has been forging axes in Lake Waccamaw, North Carolina since 1886. The Boys Axe is 2 pounds on a 28-inch straight-grain American hickory handle -- a true camp axe, not a hatchet. Drop-forged high-carbon steel, factory-ground edge, American hickory handle. It is the right tool for a car camp where you process a full cord of firewood across a weekend.
American forged steel from a company that has been making axes since 1886. The handle length makes this a real work tool.
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